It’s time again for Dancing with the Stars chatter! Share your thoughts and insights on this week’s episode of Dancing with the Stars Athletes edition from the comfort of the Pure DWTS Private Members Area. If you’re not a Pure DWTS Insider yet, you can do so here. If you are, then I look forward to the discussion in the comments.Read more..

Share this:

I'm a nerd and proud of it. Two degrees in geology also means I love BEER. :-) I'm also a Derek lover - proud of that too. So don't scream at those of us on this site and call us a bunch of "biased Derek-lovers" - it's just ME. :-) It may sound like I hate DWTS at times, but really, I'm just a snarky nitpicker from way back. And I'm cynical and jaded too. But I do love DWTS. :-)

Mirai Nagasu and Alan Bersten sound like they are working super hard. Alan says he’s not being easy on her. More below in a new Access Hollywood interview. Don’t miss reading on Alan’s new lease on life at Entertainment Tonight as well.

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

People has such a cool piece with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Did you know he has Leukemia? He does….but, that’s not stopping him from doing Dancing With The Stars (or anything for that matter!). He also talks of what rehearsals have been like for Dancing With The Stars. Check out below for what he says on his FEET …and I believe it. I love this Guy. Can you tell? Be sure to read the People link for the inspiring read. It’s a goodie!

“With Leukemia, you’re not technically in remission,” Abdul-Jabbar tells PEOPLE now. “It’s possible for it to reassert itself. In my case, what we say is I’ve managed it down to a microscopic level. There are no bad white blood cells. and that’s how we discuss the type of management that I do, which enables me to say that I’m healthy.”

Abdul-Jabbar says he feels “very lucky” to be a survivor and well enough to compete on the upcoming all-athletes season of Dancing with the Stars, which premieres April 30.

“I feel fine, and I’m very fortunate to benefit from the medical research that enable the targeted drugs to deal with the types of leukemia that I possess,” he says. “I’m very happy to be here and very happy to be participating.”

“I try to enjoy my life,” he continues. “I’m just trying to hang on here, and every day is blessing.”

On DWTS, Abdul-Jabbar is partnered with Lindsay Arnold, who won last season with Jordan Fisher, and says that even though he has “old bones,” he has “young feet.”

“It started out that I had to get my feet in shape,” he says. “I haven’t worked out like that ever. Basketball practice, you do it on your feet just like dance practice — it’s a little bit different, but you’re stretching your feet the same. It took me a couple of days to get used to that, and now it seems to be going very well. Lindsay had my shoes altered a little bit, they stretched them for me. They were a little more broken in, and now I’m doing fine.”

Abdul-Jabbar says the rehearsal process has been “very humbling” for him but that he’s “making progress.”

“It looks so simple and easily done, but when you’re trying to coordinate two people, it takes a while for both of them to learn each other’s coordinating moves and how to proceed through the sequence of things,” he says. “All of the dances [I’ve seen] throughout my life make it look so thoughtless and easy, and I can see how much work it is to pull it off — wow.”

Though Abdul-Jabbar stands at a towering 7’2″ compared to Arnold’s 5’6″, he says they’ve worked around the height difference by choosing a routine that doesn’t emphasize the discrepancy. “That’s the whole trick to this at this point,” he says.

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

I knew there was something I was forgetting to do…. 🙂 Who’s dancing what? Or..Who’s dancing TO what? Or both.

Voting Note: As we reported a couple weeks ago, there are some changes in the voting, particularly for week 1, this season. Here’s what the ABC.com press release has to say about it.

For week one, the evening’s eliminations will be based on live viewer votes cast during the show’s live broadcast in the EDT/CDT time zones, along with the judges’ scores. During the live season premiere broadcast in the EDT/CDT time zones at 8:00 p.m. EDT/7:00 p.m. CDT on Monday, April 30, viewers may cast their votes for their favorite couples, with these votes helping determine the couples who will move on to the next episode. This vote will be online only via ABC.com, will open at the top of the live show and end shortly after the last couple dances. Then, at the end of the episode, overnight voting will open for phone, ABC.com and Facebook, which will factor into the week two eliminations. Toll-free phone voting will be open nationwide from the end of the live show until 5:00 a.m. EDT/2:00 a.m. PDT on Tuesday. Online voting at ABC.com at http://dwtsvote.abc.go.com/ and on Facebook at http://bit.ly/2o1VO7b will open at the end of the live show and closes at 10:00 p.m. EDT/7:00 p.m. PDT on Tuesday. During each voting window, when voting online at ABC.com or Facebook, viewers can reallocate their votes until the voting window closes.

Heidi Comment – if you are dancing LAST, it’s an extreme disadvantage this time out, so don’t get excited if your favorite is in the “pimp spot”. This first week, at least, is no pimpage at all in going last.

ETA: Tentative dance order for the first four couples, per Rana on Twitter

Share this:

I'm a nerd and proud of it. Two degrees in geology also means I love BEER. :-) I'm also a Derek lover - proud of that too. So don't scream at those of us on this site and call us a bunch of "biased Derek-lovers" - it's just ME. :-) It may sound like I hate DWTS at times, but really, I'm just a snarky nitpicker from way back. And I'm cynical and jaded too. But I do love DWTS. :-)

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.

Keo Motsepe says this season of dancing With The Stars is going to be “amazing” and is open to doing it “different”. More below from Closer Weekly. Be sure to read the link for the whole article.

“I think the athletes we wanted to have, they can only do so much. I think the show is also trying to see if the athletes season is going to work. They didn’t want to do a whole season and have people be like, ‘Only athletes. Are they gonna be good?’ You never know. I think it’s gonna do amazing. It’s trying something different and new,” the 28-year-old told us.

But don’t worry Dancing With the Stars fans, Keo assured that the abbreviated season is still going to be super fun and will even “look like the finale on Week 1.” He continued, “I think it’s an amazing season, to have all athletes. I think for all the pros and I, the pressure is on because there are no actors or anything — it’s all athletes. I think the competition is going to be so high and expectations from the viewers will be so high. In normal seasons, when you have 12 weeks of shows, you can help them grow and build them up.” We can’t wait to watch it all unfold!

Keo will dance with softball player Jennie Finch Daigle this time around, and he shared that the competition is already intense in the ballroom. “I think me and Jennie are going to be our own competition. During the season, I always say who I think will be — but this time, since it’s all athletes, I think everyone is going to be their own competition.”

Share this:

Just a music and dancing fan here ....and a lover of life, nature, animals, and spending as much time as possible camping in our travel trailer. Favorite Quote at the moment: "Sing like no one is listening. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching, and live like it's heaven on earth." ~ William Purkey. Follow me at: Voguerista Twitter & Voguerista Soundcloud. To view my photography site, see Lisa Kay Photography.